Generally described, computing devices, such as personal computers, can access various content via a communication network, such as an intranet or the Internet. In a typical environment, a computing device executes a software application; such as a browser software application, that is configured to communicate over the communication network to acquire content from other computing devices (e.g., content providers) connected to the communication network. In a more complex embodiment, the browser software application on the client computing device can also execute additional software code, such as scripts, etc., provided by a content provider that are designed to facilitate a user experience while accessing content. In a similar light, content providers on the communication network can correspond to a variety of network-enabled services that are designed to facilitate access to content for computing devices and/or the user experience associated with the access of the content.
For many content providers, such as commercial content providers, the user experience associated with computing devices accessing content, such as the time required to access and render content on the display screen, can be a key factor to the operation of the content provider. Nevertheless, in a typical computing system, identifying whether the typical user experience regarding the time to access content is outside of the scope of acceptable standards and an accompanying cause for associated delays can be difficult. This is especially true in systems in which one or more computers are connected via a network.
In one aspect, a diminished user experience regarding the time to access content can be associated with latencies caused by the execution of the additional code by the browser software application on a client computer. In another aspect, a diminished user experience regarding the time to access content can be associated with latencies caused by the software code executing on a content provider computer. In both of the above-mentioned aspects, the latencies caused by the software code may be previously unknown to the content provider. In still a further aspect, a diminished user experience regarding the time to access content can be associated with communication bandwidth latencies caused by the individual connection to the communication network by each computing device (e.g., dial-up, DSL, cable modem, etc.). Although user experience regarding the time to access content can be measured from a start time associated with a content access request by a computing device until a finish time associated with the display of the content on the same computing device, current methodologies cannot isolate latencies associated with a content provider (e.g., latencies caused by the executable code on either the computing device or the content provider) from latencies associated by the computing devices network connection.